At the same time his habits, which were pensive and gloomy, led him to meditate a variety of schemes to punish her obstinacy.

He began to suspect that there was little hope of succeeding by open force, and therefore determined to have recourse to treachery.
He found in Grimes an instrument sufficiently adapted to his purpose.
This fellow, without an atom of intentional malice, was fitted, by the mere coarseness of his perceptions, for the perpetration of the greatest injuries.

He regarded both injury and advantage merely as they related to the gratifications of appetite; and considered it an essential in true wisdom, to treat with insult the effeminacy of those who suffer themselves to be tormented with ideal misfortunes.

He believed that no happier destiny could befal a young woman than to be his wife; and he conceived that that termination would amply compensate for any calamities she might suppose herself to undergo in the interval.

He was therefore easily prevailed upon, by certain temptations which Mr.Tyrrel knew how to employ, to take part in the plot into which Miss Melville was meant to be betrayed.
Matters being thus prepared, Mr.Tyrrel proceeded, through the means of the gaoler (for the experience he already had of personal discussion did not incline him to repeat his visits), to play upon the fears of his prisoner.